MASTER OF ITS DOMAIN

Now, this is something. The show about "nothing" turns out what may be the best TV DVD release yet.

Seinfeld landing on video shelves today would be news enough. But the way the 40 episodes of its first three seasons are being supplemented with hours of background material merits front-page news in the entertainment industry.

Conventional wisdom has been that the vast majority of viewers don't care about DVD "extras" -- they just watch the episodes. Begging to differ are tubeheads such as the 140,000 registered users of the encyclopedic news site www.tvshowsondvd.com. These fans avidly check daily updates of not only what's coming out when, but which extras are included. They know studios tend to scrimp on sitcoms especially: The recent release of The Andy Griffith Show offered not a single supplemental interview, optional audio commentary or even on-screen text about this classic show. Executives at Andy's releasing studio, Paramount, are apparently among those deeming extras dispensable.

"I disagree with those people," contends Howard West. As Jerry Seinfeld's longtime manager with partner George Shapiro, West was an executive producer of the 1990-98 NBC series and a spearhead of the two DVD volumes from Columbia TriStar -- separate five-disc sets devoted to seasons 1-2 and to season 3, list-priced at $50 each.

"The Seinfeld show, people can see four times a day on different stations," West said by phone from Beverly Hills in the accent of his Bronx boyhood. "Why would they buy the DVD? The key to me and the others working on this, creatively, is: What can we give them that they don't have? [To do] otherwise would've been cheating the public. This show deserves the best. And we feel like we served it well."

The Seinfeld DVDs aren't just a collection of episodes but a true document of this unique series about a stand-up comic and his three screwy friends hanging out around New York City. Together, the sets feature optional audio episode commentaries by cast and crew for 15 episodes, deleted scenes, blooper reels, early Seinfeld stand-up footage, optional on-screen trivia throughout each episode and two new documentaries.

The first volume's 65-minute look back at the series' birth features 20 new interviews with cast and crew, network and studio executives, West and Shapiro. Made by Morgan Sackett and Darin Henry, writer-producers who worked on Seinfeld, the film's professional polish includes an ASC union cinematographer and location footage on the streets of Manhattan, with Seinfeld pointing out where he and co-creator Larry David crafted their sitcom concept in the late 1980s.

Even better, this history, titled "How It Began," conveys the offhand spirit of the show. Where most perfunctory TV DVD retrospectives stitch together episode clips and talking heads in bland backgrounds, Seinfeld places its interviewees in distinct and beautifully filmed situations -- co-star Jason Alexander on a soundstage, Julia Louis-Dreyfus at an ocean-side window, director Tom Cherones on a studio backlot -- where they're so relaxed, their personalities spring to life.

Cherones remembers initially thinking of the show, "Who cares? What are they talking about?" Seinfeld recalls David proposing a series built around "just nonsense and idiotic conversation," to which Jerry reacted sarcastically, "Yeah. That's a show."

NBC's then-programmer Warren Littlefield judiciously notes that "there certainly wasn't a strong story drive," and Alexander recalls telling his show's star, "No way" would his preoccupied city humor work on a weekly basis: "I think the No. 1 show in America is Alf."

But it did work, of course -- after fits and starts with the pilot (in July 1989), the four-episode first season (summer 1990) and the 13-episode second season (spring 1991). And Seinfeld kept on clicking through 180 half hours. The cast-crew chemistry is reflected in the ebullience of these interviews, filling Vol. 1's documentary, Vol. 2's 25-minute portrait of Michael Richards' Kramer character and each DVD's optional "Inside Looks." These brief supplements to 32 specific episodes devote two to five minutes each to that show's making.

If it was constant tension that drove the characters of Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer into absurd Seinfeld situations, it's all convivial cheer in the interviews here, marked by meandering asides and frequent bursts of off-camera laughter.

"That was all of us shooting, hanging in the background," says West, 72. "There were maybe eight or 10 of us around, and it's all natural and unrehearsed. It goes right back to the show -- friends having fun, doing what they do, patting each other on the back and whacking each other on the knee."

Viewers get swept into the spirit, too, since the interviews aren't "cleaned up" to eliminate the extraneous guffaws. Just as those Seinfeld episodes trusted us to get the gist of their strange twists, the DVDs take us into their confidence and camaraderie.

TV DVD is one of the fastest-growing segments of the video market. A recent Merrill Lynch report estimates it will take in $2.3 billion this year and $3.9 billion by 2008. The market segment's best seller had been the first season of The Simpsons, with nearly 2 million units, until Comedy Central announced last month its sketch series Chappelle's Show had topped that. Industry observer Gord Lacey, who founded tvshowsondvd.com in 2001, says he wouldn't be surprised if Seinfeld quickly scored in that ballpark. "Chappelle is a cable show," Lacey says. "But Seinfeld -- who hasn't seen an episode of Seinfeld? It's going to be a huge, huge release. People have been waiting for this so long."

His Web site's voting for shows most-wanted on DVD has long-ranked Seinfeld near the top, and distributor Columbia TriStar is making sure fans know about the DVD release with TV ads in high-profile programs such as Monday Night Football.

Awareness is then augmented by the added value of all those DVD extras. "It's a loaded release," Lacey says. "There's not usually much stuff done with sitcoms -- maybe a couple of commentary tracks, a short interview, and that's that. They've kind of gone all out [with Seinfeld] and given the fans stuff that they want."

One reason may be that West's DVD team actually asked fans what they wanted. "They did a lot of research," notes Lacey. "We had reports of people being approached in shopping malls and asked to fill out surveys about what cover art they'd like, what bonus gifts they'd like."

As a result, the two volumes can also be bought together in a $120 list-priced "Re-gift Set," a name that reflects the series episode about giving away received gifts. That set also includes a script, Seinfeld playing cards and commemorative Monk's salt-and-pepper shakers.

If these were designed with care around series events, so are many of the DVDs' on-screen features. Menus and submenus of each disc's content appear within different Seinfeld settings -- Jerry's apartment, the coffee shop, episode locations such as the Chinese restaurant and the parking garage -- enlivened by pop-up series clips. Episode menus are printed on the sides of cereal boxes, that Seinfeld mainstay.

Many of these series' touchstones were inspired by real-life incidents finally explained on the DVD's interviews and commentaries. David discusses how his relationship with ex-girlfriend Monica Yates fueled the character of Elaine. We hear how specific moments in writers' lives wound up sparking plots. And because most of the commentaries are done in groups -- Alexander, Louis-Dreyfus and Richards together, or Seinfeld with David -- there's an intimate conversational tone. As David and Seinfeld watch The Pen, in which Jerry and Elaine stay with Jerry's parents in Florida, David notes Elaine's discomfort on a fold-out bed frame. He wonders aloud, "Have there been improvements in convertible sofas over the years?"

They're off on a tangent, babbling about nothing. And we're right there with them, behind the scenes, savoring Seinfeld all over again.